Thomas Sabo – Global Retail Traffic Analytics Solution

Thomas Sabo is an innovative and globally renowned lifestyle brand based in Lauf an der Pegnitz, southern Germany. The company, founded by Thomas Sabo in 1984 employs more than 380 people in Germany, and internationally has around 1,300 employees. As one of the leading providers in the jewellery, watches and beauty market, the company has a presence in 66 countries on all five continents. Thomas Sabo can be found in some of the world’s greatest cities, including Berlin, Stockholm, Paris, London, Los Angeles, Toronto, Hong Kong and Sydney.

Business Situation

Thomas Sabo was an early adopter of foot traffic analytics and had previously used a counting system within a small number of its stores. The challenge the company faced was in harnessing store data globally. This became a priority at board level. Rather than just relying on sales data, Thomas Sabo’s CEO led an initiative to find a solution that could give the management team a holistic view of how the entire store network was performing. This would take into account conversion rate and operational analysis as well as marketing effectiveness and customer engagement.

The management team also recognized the potential for accurate foot traffic analytics to provide insight into staffing levels and training requirements.

As the company’s existing solution was unable to provide the functionality or global reach to deliver this level of analysis, the decision was made to invest with a new partner.

Solution

Thomas Sabo selected ShopperTrak’s retail traffic counting and analytics across 86 standalone stores worldwide. The system is being used across 13 countries to provide the company with daily insight into store performance.

ShopperTrak was chosen for its global reach as well as its ability to convert data from multiple local currencies into Euros for analysis at Thomas Sabo’s corporate headquarters in Germany.

The solution was rolled out across the network following a pilot with ten stores. ShopperTrak and Thomas Sabo ran focus groups with store managers during the pilot to improve engagement and gain buy in before the global deployment took place.

Challenges

One of the key factors in the decision making process was ease of use. ShopperTrak stood out not only because of its functionality and accuracy but it was also the most user friendly solution. A crucial element in its success was to ensure that individual store managers could see the value of the system, so it was imperative that the system was intuitive and that they were able to use it effectively.

Another challenge lay in conversion between multiple currencies. The management team was keen to have visibility on performance across the store network but to analyse figures centrally at head office, in Euros. ShopperTrak worked with Thomas Sabo to develop a system that would enable the company to take data directly from each location but convert it into Euros, providing easy to interpret like-for-like comparisons across stores.

Results

The solution is making a significant difference to individual store performance. Historically staff rotas were drawn up on the assumptions and gut feelings of the store managers and did not accurately reflect peak traffic times.

ShopperTrak’s Power Hours reporting now gives Thomas Sabo accurate insight into peak selling times that occur during the week. This is crucial for ensuring that store managers are prepared and properly staffed. Traffic information is used as a key barometer in helping to determine appropriate staffing levels and enabling managers to make sure that the right staff are on the shop floor at the right times. This not only has an impact on potential sales opportunities but also delivers a better customer experience.

Thomas Sabo has plans to extend the solution across its global network of franchises. While conversion rates and average transaction rates are currently analysed through the system, the company would like to work with ShopperTrak to integrate items per customer data – making the solution a one-stop shop for store reporting.